


You’re Pretty Pretty (And You Feel Like Home)

by Grinner_H



Series: 15 a Piece Prompt Challenge [9]
Category: Finder no Hyouteki | Finder Series
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-23
Updated: 2016-02-23
Packaged: 2018-05-22 19:25:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 2,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6091552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Grinner_H/pseuds/Grinner_H
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eight drabbles about Takaba and Fei Long.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CaptainTsukiko](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainTsukiko/gifts).



> For Prompt #43 - _Heart Song_ (selected by **[Ash](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ashida)** from **[200 Writing Challenge](http://insane-1.deviantart.com/art/200-Writing-Challenge-68163506)** ).

_"He looks like trouble."_

_"You’re better off staying away."_

Akihito hears the warnings like whispers, the kind that're voiced in urgent, scandalous tones in dank alleys and darkened nightclub corners. 

He hears them all, listens to none. 

For there is something to be said about _that man._

Something about the graceful tumble of lengthy, obsidian hair over slender shoulders. 

Something about the subtle upward curve of pale pink lips in a secret smile; about long legs and elegant lightfootedness. 

But most of all, there's something about the quiet hitch of breath when Akihito bites down upon the satin-smooth juncture where neck meets clavicle. 

And then there's _this._

That man's back pressed against a bathroom floor, his hair fanning out beneath him like flower petals unfurled. 

The cold of the tiles - numbingly hard - against Akihito's knees.

Arms and legs and tight, tight _heat_ enveloping him, pulling him down into dark depths like an unnameable force and dear _god,_ Akihito does _not_ wish to come up for air.

Akihito hears warnings like rumors, heeds none. 

For Fei Long is trouble like sin, and Akihito doesn't want to resist.


	2. Chapter 2

"Just try it on," Akihito plead-commands, tongue caressing the soft flesh of Fei Long's ear lobe like a lewd promise, hand slipping into the waistband of his lover's jeans. 

And then there's nothing but the rustle of fabric and the clink of belts against the floor; teeth on skin and _contactcontactcontact._

Someone bangs rudely on the door of the dressing room. 

Akihito clamps a quick hand over Fei Long's mouth, yells at whoever's outside to _just fuck off._

They emerge forty-nine minutes later, gloriously disheveled and thoroughly unapologetic. 

Fei Long's wearing a _just fucked_ look and a brand new t-shirt which - somewhere mid-fuck - Akihito had successfully wrestled him into. 

The t-shirt is black and tight, emblazoned with glittery silver letters that boldly proclaim, _I'm so gay, I shit rainbows._

Akihito sports a coprophagous grin and a gleefully victorious gaze. 

_Winning is just too much fun._


	3. Chapter 3

Akihito doesn’t talk about it, but sometimes - when Fei Long lies in deep slumber - he explores his lover’s body with furtive, stolen touches.

He traces the puckered flesh on Fei Long’s left breast, something like horror and relief curdling in his gut. 

Fei Long could have died. _Should_ have died.

Akihito doesn’t like to think about it, but - like a man witnessing a speeding train running off the rails - he can’t bring himself to turn away from such macabre contemplations. 

Akihito wonders what his life would be like without Fei Long in it. He wonders why he wonders that at all. 

He gently caresses the scar Asami made - the one on the upper left side of Fei Long’s stomach.

Akihito remembers the paralyzing terror he’d felt that day - not for Fei Long nor himself. 

Only for Asami. 

Asami’s urgency. Asami’s pain. Asami’s blood. _Everywhere, everywhere._

He doesn’t like to admit it, but deep inside some dark corner of his mind - somewhere he’d always known existed, but never openly acknowledged - Akihito remembers that tiny flicker of satisfaction he’d felt when Fei Long was shot.

It’s in moments like this he’d shut his eyes tight, as if he could block out the memories with such a pointless action.

And then there’s the scar on Fei Long’s left palm. 

Akihito often wonders about the story behind that scar. 

The only time Fei Long spoke about it, he'd claimed to have been bitten by a dog. 

But the scar is long and thin, as if carved by a blade. 

Akihito remembers discovering a similar scar on the back of Asami’s right hand; one Asami never spoke of either. 

And as he places a featherlight kiss on Fei Long’s palm, Akihito wonders many things. 

Like why the most significant of Fei Long’s wounds were always inflicted upon the left side of his body. 

Or why he envies a history he never learned between two men he’d move worlds for. 

Akihito doesn’t talk about it, but most of all, he wonders about the day Fei Long would finally wear the scars of _his_ making.


	4. Chapter 4

He can’t unsee it. 

Tear tracks on an ashen face. Whimpers from trembling lips. Blood between slender legs.

Takaba Akihito on his bed, used and shattered. 

Somewhere in his mind, a voice rings - hateful and accusing. Caustic. _Mocking._

_You did this._

_**You** did this!_

_When did you turn into Yan Tsui?_

—

He can’t stop it. 

This revulsion that churns bone-deep, makes him claw at his face, his arms, his body like he’s trying to drag his very skeleton from his flesh. 

_Make it stop, Make it stop, Make it fucking stop!!!_

Fei Long wants to scream until his throat bleeds. 

—

He can’t comprehend it. 

Takaba Akihito rising from his bed. In his earth-brown eyes, empathy. Compassion. _Forgiveness._

And a spirit _unbroken._

_You don’t deserve it._

_You don’t deserve **him.**_

Akihito pulls Fei Long toward him, against him.

Fei Long lets himself fall.


	5. Chapter 5

Fei Long had tried to teach him once, what it meant to _take._

Akihito remembers this in startlingly vivid detail - the whack of Fei Long’s kiseru upon the crown of his head, the sweat that adorned his eyelids and temples beneath the thin cotton of a crimson blindfold.

He can effortlessly recall the way Fei Long looked, tasted, smelled, felt when he came apart beneath Akihito’s lips, tongue, hands. 

And he remembers - half-blind - the brilliant rush of power he’d felt then, and the image of Fei Long undone and dyed red.

—

 _Fei Long,_ Akihito thinks, _could stand to learn a lesson or two of his own._

The bed in his apartment is much narrower, much less comfortable than the one in Bái Shé’s headquarters. 

Akihito loves its worn sheets and its too-thin mattress, loves how Fei Long looks sprawled all over it. 

"Tell me what you’re thinking," Akihito demands, hooking a steady arm beneath his lover’s left knee and driving into tight, silken heat. 

Fei Long - so many years ago now - had tried to teach him thoughtlessness in more ways than one. 

Akihito remembers failing that lesson. He wonders if Fei Long would fail it too. 

But Fei Long’s answer - this nearly indecipherable thing - sounds so much like _want_ and _crave._

It sounds so much like Akihito’s name.

And Akihito can’t resist kissing him then - the kind of kiss that says, _This doesn’t have to be about control._

It’s in that moment that something inside Fei Long shatters. Akihito bears witness to its breaking in the depths of Fei Long’s dark, tumultuous eyes, in the grip of his fingers against the hairs on Akihito’s nape.

Akihito watches Fei Long fall apart - so different yet still the same - and believes that, eight years after that first lesson, Fei Long has finally learned what it means to _give._


	6. Chapter 6

On most days, Takaba Akihito is blaring rock music and vintage leather pants; lyrics whispered like dirty little secrets in narrow bathroom stalls of shady nightclubs.

Somedays, he’s the seductive throb of slow jazz and dimmed light; toppled bottles of beer on the floor amid clothes and haste and time forgotten.

On certain days, he’s a pop song and sunshine; cheap wine and roses and all that good shit like he fancies himself the most romantic guy in all the world.

There are days when he’s a show tune and glaring neon; hurried, heavy footfalls beating upon the ground, as if he’s trying to carve AKIHITO WAS HERE into wood and earth and dirt and concrete.

But the most precious days - the ones Fei Long holds dearest - are the ones when Akihito is a mellow acoustic tune and a soul bared; soothing touches and honest eyes which say the only words that really matter.


	7. Chapter 7

At six, love is a note that simply reads, _Will you marry me?_

It is written in Akihito’s best handwriting, concealed within an origami flower fashioned out of hastily torn notebook paper.

The object of his affections is a delightfully pretty little thing of chestnut curls and the brightest smile Akihito has ever seen. 

It is _that_ smile - not the blazing afternoon sun - that lights up the entire playground. This, Akihito firmly believes. 

He sits beneath the shade of a Chinese hackberry tree and - as all boys in love are wont to do - admires her longingly from afar. 

He thinks about presenting her the flower in some sweeping, grand gesture straight out of a cheesy romance movie. He thinks about her acceptance, about their lives together in a home with blue shutters and a white picket fence. 

But when she glances in his direction, he loses his nerve.

And Akihito scurries out of the playground before he can even learn her name; the paper flower beneath the tree, forgotten.

—

At eleven, love is - to Akihito’s immense relief - unrequited.

The boy he’s crushing on is tall, athletic, confident. He’s got that kind of carefree, boisterous laugh which - Akihito thinks - is the best sound in all the world. 

Akihito’s crush lasts for two weeks. 

It wilts quicker than a drenched paper flower the moment he catches Takato trying to impress a girl by strumming an acoustic guitar and singing _Mystify._

_Loudly and offkey._

In Akihito’s preadolescent mind, there is _nothing_ more unattractive than ruining a good rock song.

—

At fifteen, love is an older, far more experienced woman who takes his virginity.

Akihito - convinced that he’s a full-grown _man_ who understands all there is to know about _sex_ and _women_ and sex _with_ women - spectacularly succeeds in thoroughly embarrassing himself in all of six minutes. 

Aoki Mayu pats him on the shoulder in what appears to be a mockery of sympathy, informs him that most boys his age only last _two._

Knowing this does not make Akihito feel any better.

—

At eighteen, love is lust, unconstrained.

Most of his days are spent bent over hard wooden desks, or draped over squeaky office chairs; getting ruthlessly fucked into college furniture by his Journalism professor.

Akihito knows how wrong all this looks and can’t bring himself to care. 

Not when Asami-sensei looks so fucking irresistible. 

Not when it feels this damn _good,_ and fuck it all, he’s _always_ been a rule-breaker anyway.

And when - somewhere mid-term - Asami receives a job transfer to another prefecture, Akihito claims his lips in a bruising kiss and tells him he won’t miss him.

It is their first and only kiss. And it feels like a lie.

—

At twenty-four, love is true. 

This, Akihito steadfastly believes on the day he marries Ai-chan.

In Akihito’s adult mind, she is perfect. There are countless reasons - some of them unfathomable - why loving her comes so easily to him. 

But it isn’t until two years later, when he’s cradling a newborn baby in his arms - one that bears her mother’s soft, blonde hair and Akihito’s hazel eyes - that Akihito truly understands the meaning of _love at first sight._

—

At twenty-seven, love is lost.

His only reasons for living are robbed from him by a drunken pilot and a broken plane.

When he is told that no trace remains of his wife and child, not even a tooth or bone or trinket left to bury, Akihito’s perfect world crumbles.

—

At thirty-six, love is starting over. 

The new town he’s relocated to is small, his new neighborhood, quiet.

Akihito lives in the monotony of his daily existence; moving through new streets and new faces, feeling exactly the same.

Until the day he finds an unexpected splash of color in his monochrome world.

The man is beautiful - long, dark hair piled high on his head, porcelain skin, and an enigmatic smile Akihito just can’t tear his gaze away from.

Akihito spies him through the window of a flower shop, which he doesn’t resist entering.

When he leaves, there are two stalks of snowdrops in his hand, a grin on his face, and newfound _life_ in his step.

And there is a euphonious voice in his head, a name he enjoys tangling his tongue around.

_Liu Fei Long._

Akihito doesn’t _want_ to fall in love. 

He does, anyway.


	8. Chapter 8

_This could be what heaven feels like,_ Akihito muses, the curve of his back against cool glass, his legs outstretched upon hard cement. 

He is sitting on the balcony floor of his apartment, leaning against the sliding door in what can only be called _bad posture._

Akihito considers getting off the ground and stretching his limbs out. The dull ache in his lower back is somewhat annoying and his legs have already fallen asleep.

Laziness, and the pleasure of his company wins out.

For by his side, Fei Long sits - knees pulled to his chest and eyes trained upon the horizon. "The sun may rise red today," he remarks, muffled around the barrel of his cigarette.

Akihito empties his can of shitty beer, crushes it noisily in an imitation of Stone Cold Steve Austin. 

He watches Fei Long cringe - subtle, but it’s _there_ \- and can’t hold back the grin that worms its way across his features.

 _How cute,_ Akihito thinks, grinning wider when Fei Long shoots him a castigating glare.

He tosses the crushed can aimlessly. It bounces off the balcony rail and clatters against the stone floor amid the pile of ash and cigarette butts. Akihito reaches for another in the near-empty six-pack between them. "Maybe the sun won’t rise at all."

The truth is, he doesn’t especially care if it does. He’s content to sit here like this, cloaked in semi-darkness, watching his lover, uninhibited.

Fei Long’s _always_ fascinating to him - strange and beautiful and extraordinarily ordinary. 

There’s nothing Akihito enjoys observing more than his lover.

"What is it?" Fei Long asks, when he catches Akihito staring. He looks at Akihito like he’s genuinely perplexed - one more endearing trait that has another grin slicking up the sides of Akihito’s face.

He pops the top off his beer can, smiles around the mouth. "Nothing. Just thinking about how much you feel like home."


End file.
